The Hype Economy reader Siobhan B. shares her views on today’s world
In an ideal world, atomic bombs were never invented, people listen to Greta’s pleas and we are not fighting tooth and nail to prove that we are better writers than AI could ever be.
Also in an ideal world, we are not gunning down people because of their skin colour or sexual orientation, we are not under the panopticon gaze of technology and bot-cops aren’t policing us based on the standards of AI.
But we are not in an ideal world, we are far from it. We are currently living in a dystopia. We are victims of a paradox that we created by ourselves, chasing our own tails. And because we are not in an ideal world and we never will be, my (very obvious) punches thrown towards AI is justifiable.
I am a disciple of Nolan. His oeuvre will have me writing odes and epics. This time around, I walked into the theatre with the anticipation of listening to Hans Zimmer’s score in dolby atmos. But I walked out of the theatre with the dread of the amplified sound of the silence that followed the atomic bomb blast, resonating in my ears. Because I had a moment of epiphany, one that made me realise that we were in fact, facing the music of our own consequences. This time around I am not writing odes and epics, but rather a rant. An angry one.
Tell me why his latest movie ‘Oppenheimer’ had me drawing parallels between J. Robert Oppenheimer and the AI experts who are trying to raise red flags about the speed at which AI is progressing. Tell me why Nolan’s proposition that perhaps the most dangerous force in this world is ‘us’, was staring right in my eye in the form of Artificial Intelligence. Tell me why, despite all the din and racket created around how AI has the ability to develop more advanced cyberattacks, override security measures and exploit vulnerabilities in technology we are still moving forward with it. Tell me why all these loud appeals just become silent, repressed screams when it reaches the higher ups. Tell me why my nightmares tell me that my job as a writer can be replaced by a mere chatbot.
It is not news that AI has upended the world. To put it simply, it is at the centre of all things good (debatable) and all things bad (proven). The godfather of AI: Geoffrey Hinton quit Google this year because he himself could not wrap his head around the scary side of AI. He openly discusses the serious threat of advanced AI. Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, joined many others in urging a halt to building powerful AI systems.
But higher-ups are not ready to listen. I am not the least bit surprised that red flags raised about AI are being swept under the rug because after all we are the same species that shrugged our shoulders at nuclear cautions regarding the hydrogen bombs. This is just a case of history repeating itself.
According to these ‘decision makers’ or the ones assigned to make the calls on behalf of the society (who even gave them that right), AI makes (their) life easier. What is scarier than the detriment of AI is that the ones who are refusing to rein in the evolution of AI are aware that there is pea under the mattresses. One that they can feel the discomfort of and one that they have been warned of. Despite it all, a blind eye has been turned.
AI has already started a chain reaction that might destroy the entire world. That is if the mercenaries, warmongers and corporate moguls don’t do it first. The way that AI is evolving has given life to my fear that humans are too powerful and will be the end of themselves. And to think that AI is just one out of a thousand threats that are looming over humanity is horrifying beyond belief.